Color me naive, but I would let it be known through private (i.e. unofficial) channels that if China continues to rattle sabres in the South China Sea, it can expect more of the same. Ditto for continuing to prop up N. Korea.
And China would let it be known that it will do whatever it wants in territory it considers sovereign. Lather, rinse, repeat.
And we unofficially like China propping up North Korea - it has the added benefit of China keeping them on a short leash (to a certain extent). At the very least it adds stability to a country which produces none domestically.
[quote=“Me_Billy, post:10, topic:774033”]
The Chinese “glass heart” - a video by westerners living in China…
(“Pack mentality” discussed at 5:30 on video.)
This was enlightening; thanks for posting.
Guessing there will be no significant or lasting fallout from this particular, um, action. He’ll probably manage to Forrest Gump his way out of this, landing if not on his feet, than at least upright. Folks in the US will promptly forget about the incident as our attention will ripped away shortly to the next completely unnecessary crisis caused by whatever actions he engages in to keep the spotlight on him. We should probably try to get used to it as best we can. At least until the impeachment proceedings (which aren’t scheduled for another 18-24 months).
What exactly do you mean by “more of the same”? More of what?
The same China that makes our iPhones. The same China that sells us $480 billion worth of stuff a year while only buying $120 billion from us. The same China that managed to build a 12,000 mile high-speed rail network. The same China that just launched 2 astronauts to their own space station - something the US currently cannot do.
LOL
Eventually the press will get tired of reporting Trump’s faux pas and focus on real issues.
haha just kidding…
Issues more important than the faux pas of the President Elect.
That “deal” is a joke. [del]The world[/del] China believes Trump is a joke.
Are you suggesting that the President’s actions and words aren’t “real issues”? There are reasons to think his phone call was a calculated political move.
Only by people who think Trump could possibly be competent. The fact that he didn’t even know what the job of being president entails suggests otherwise.
Near as I can tell, as soon as Trump realized that being President was really work, he decided he didn’t want the job - he wanted the attention of getting the job.
He has now made a joke of appointments - the head of WWE (the “Professional Wrestling” folks) as Small Business Administration, and, of course, the AG who is suing the EPA is to be the new Secretary of EPA.
(can’t make this stuff up, writ large).
Maybe, just maybe, he is deliberately screwing up everything in the hope that the Electors will give the job to Clinton and he can go back to grabbing pussy.
I always think about the implications of China “selling us less crap”. I’d like to go to the store and see “made in America” and the jobs that come with those words. It would greatly simplify my purchase decisions.
That’s such a fuck stupid thing to say I can’t address it without getting a warning.
Then it doesn’t matter and this thread is pointless.
But if you think the deal is a joke then you should cite all the other jobs saved by President-elects. Take your time. I’ll wait.
The President-Elect did not save any jobs. The actual sitting governor of the state of Indiana bribed a company with tax credits to not move some jobs. This is something so unusual that only every single governor of every state does this practically every single day of the year. Somehow, though, you don’t hear about those bribes being connected to the President-Elect, probably because they are not being offered by the actual sitting governor of Indiana, who by coincidence happens to be the Vice President-Elect.
It was a nice publicity stunt and a good piece of political theater, although only to people who are eager to accept it as such. It’s almost exactly like a rube winning the first hand at a game of three-card monte. The proper thing at that point is to walk away with the money. It’s playing the next hand that marks you as a rube. Let’s see who stays in the game that has already revealed itself as fixed.
Here you go
http://www.politico.com/agenda/story/2016/12/obama-pennsylvania-refinery-trump-carrier-000255
admittedly, Obama wasn’t the President-elect. He was the sitting President running for re-election.
It isn’t quite the same since this had broad national implications (gasoline supply of the entire northeast) and the Obama administration chose to keep it quiet until after the election.
And a few days after the deal, the CEO of Carrier’s parent company announced that those “saved” jobs will be lost to automation.
And now Carrier has 7 million dollars to offset some of the cost of automating the plant.
There are plenty reasons to not like Trump, but when it turns to ritual jumping on each thing he says and does, no real context or serious discussion of any underlying issue, it becomes pointless IMO.
I see two stages to understanding the incident. Stage one was speculating Trump had no idea the implication of receiving (or publicizing having received) the call as well as referring to Tsai as President rather than just ‘leader’ of Taiwan. But since then it appears it was at the suggestion of advisers, including those named to positions in the admin or likely to be.
In that case IMO one has to give some consideration to whether the relationship with China, which very few Americans find satisfactory AFAIK, is really best managed by pretty much strictly kid gloves treatment of China. That’s basically been Obama’s (as well as Bush’s and Bill Clinton’s) approach. Again not liking Trump much myself as messenger, there are a lot of issues where the message is ‘the status quo haven’t been working’. Most Americans seem to feel this (marginal majority Obama personal popularity, but mainly since he started being compared personally with Trump and Clinton, underwater for a lot of his presidency, doesn’t disprove it).
Can one make the argument it’s strictly unfavorable from risk/reward standpoint to do essentially what China does every day letting North Korea be an irritant to US and its Allies, and make Taiwan a bit more of an irritant for China? And it’s just words*. So if it weren’t Trump, is it so obvious that a slightly more aggressive posture v China is foolish? I don’t see that.
*I lived for some years in Confucian countries, fair at Korean though only read don’t speak much Japanese and don’t read Chinese as well as the other two. I don’t pretend to be an expert, but IME there isn’t a simple rule that you never try to drive a hard bargain with people from those countries because ‘they’ll lose face’.